Moving back to the US - how is non-US work experience viewed?

I'm currently in the process of moving back to the US for various reasons but am gaining little traction with companies and recruiters. I'm a citizen but my US network is pretty thin as I did my undergrad and worked abroad (~4 years in RE AM/public REITs for a US/European office portfolio).

Does anyone know which shops are currently most active in LA, preferably for AM/capital markets roles? Preference is LA but open to other gateway cities for the right role. Any tips on breaking in and networking in general would also be appreciated.

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Do you have LA/SoCal ties prior to going overseas? If not, that's going to be a bigger hurdle than being overseas. Easy coast people sometimes struggle to connect out here, let alone international. 

And was your overseas stint somewhere an American could locate on a map? As stupid as it sounds, there are "cool" countries that people would be interested in talking to you about and "lame" countries that hiring managers may not even have heard of before. 

The opposite of that would be if you could speak another language, especially Asian languages. I see more jobs than you would think that ask for Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, or Korean bi-lingual abilities. 

Commercial Real Estate Developer
 

That’s interesting. Do you know specific groups that tend to hire for those bilingual roles?

For context, I speak Korean and actually grew up in LA - I just don't have a huge network in finance/real estate here as I studied and worked in Europe and Korea. I’m also trying to understand where this kind of background can create leverage here.

 

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